Steve Dalachinsky and Yuko Otomo read from Frozen Heatwave

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On April 1 of this year, Steve Dalachinsky and Yuko Otomo came over to my place for coffee and bagels and to read some poetry. It was a wonderful afternoon, as easy as the Vimeo you are about to see. I had specifically asked them to read from Frozen Heatwave wanting to capture that adroit, loving, clever, argumentative, impressive, endearingly enduring collaboration that was their relationship. I will always remember them together. Even when one got up to read a poem, the other was there somewhere in the room.

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https://vimeo.com/360779416

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The first page of Frozen Heatwave, which they don’t read on the Vimeo, follows. It was written on a subway train. The lines in italics are Yuko’s.
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FROZEN HEATWAVE

roses trapped behind chainlink

sunset or sunrise
who will embrace their fragrance?

frozen heatwave

in summer
or in winter

as i face my panic attacks

don’t ask me why I write
a line such as this

start here…go anywhere

let’s escape!
be confident!

escape your roommates

stealing your idea?
who cares what idea
belongs to who!
It’s about Flower Bird
Wind & Moon anyway

it’s about turtle shirts making a difference
getting paid: from apple to apple

a child talking to himself
as the train moves on
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In the summer of 2017, subway trains took Steve and Yuko to see Marsden Hartley’s Maine at the Met Breuer, and Robert Rauschenberg: Among Friends, and Making Space: Women Artists and Postwar Abstraction at MoMA. The lines in italics are Yuko’s:
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At the Robert Rauschenberg exhibit at MoMA: Among Friends, June 26, 2017
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Grand Black Tie Sperm Glut, 1987

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in the universe
where there is no up/down/left/right
arrows mean
nothing
no direction home
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At the Marsden Hartley show, Maine, the Met Breuer, June 15, 2017
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Marsden Hartley (American, 1877-1943). The Wave, 1940. Oil on masonite-type hardboard, 30 1⁄4 x 40 7/8 in. (76.8 x 103.8 cm). Worcester Art Museum

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wave

vertically
crashing
water reflects a storm
inside me
in the evening
I become
a dramatic
cry of awe

an animated vibrancy
… responding to sound
transcendent penile resurrection
dark landscapes surrounded by
pretentious onlookers & economy
h(e)art Cranes abundantly cresting ghost

a fishy mix as feathers fly from
stoic lonely birds
…………… “the invisible life of the place”
……………… pork chop lighthouse before
& after the storm …the hunter the lobster
the wave the champ(ion)
to sea dog …tying (k)nots
cutting decadent mouth
water